Blighter,
your arguments regarding location....
Would be great if there was actually any surplus accommodation for people to move from Lyneham to Brize to; instead of splitting the base accommodation between Faringdon, Fairford, South Cerney and whatever rabbit hutches the construct at Brize.
To make matters worse, DHE have 2 major problems next year. They have a full battalion moving to South Cerney next year, so all there will be full.There is also discussion going on at the moment about how much accommodation they are going to take up at Lyneham...
As to living in the local area, have you seen house prices in Oxford? I can barely afford to buy a decent 3 bed semi on middle rate flying pay and if you think my kids are going to be educated in an area that hasnt the additional funding to cope with an estimated 500+ families moving from lyneham, you have another thing coming. Closest affordable place I found within commuting distance of Brize was 40 miles away!
Thanks to the boomer generation for that one...
Believe me, HTD (in its current reduced form) saves the MOD money... if I couldnt get paid to commute, I would either expect a room in the mess (which Brize doesnt have) or a quarter (which brize doesnt have). You might want to compare SSFA costs to HTD costs, especially considering the supply/demand issues they have in the oxford area.